Challenge Series: 1 Week At The Gym

The Galileo Journalism staff recently embarked on individual challenges meant to push their boundaries and lead to improvement. Each challenge lasted between one to two weeks and was meant to evoke some self realization. Here are their stories.

During my senior year at Galileo, I haven’t been very active physically. This became apparent to me one day when I walked up to the fourth floor and realized I was out of breath. This lack of fitness made me want to choose to go the gym for a week as my personal challenge. I felt that if I could commit to this, it could help me start getting into the habit of being physically active.

Going to the gym every day for a week was a difficult task. I went to the JCC (Jewish Community Center) because it’s close to my house and 2 months ago I signed up for a monthly membership, but I failed to be committed to going. When I first got the membership I was going everyday, but slowly, I lost motivation. I would skip days to hang out with friends and I eventually just stopped going all together.

Because my personal challenge was a class assignment and meant for an article, it gave me a reason to commit. Along with that, I personally wanted to gym for my own benefit. All this together helped me commit for my one week. Most of my time is usually taken up by friends, so instead of planning to hang with them after school, I would go to the gym. I put aside this time for gymming, and would find time afterwards to hang out with friends and complete other tasks of mine like finishing homework.

One of the hardest things to begin with, was just the simple task of commiting. What made committing so difficult was having to work around my schedule to fit in gymming. Everyday after school, going out of my way to commute, working out for an hour, commuting back and showering all approximately took 2 hours out of my day. While this would take a lot from my day, it also added a lot to my livelihood.

While at the gym, my routine consisted of the following. I would rotate every other day from upper body to lower body. I used machines ranging from the leg press to the bench press and everything in between. While at the gym, I would typically stay for an hour and work without a break. The difficult part for me, was not this process but instead the mental aspect of it. I found it difficult to maintain the motivation I had to gym when I first began my challenge.

One week isn’t a large amount of time to grow physically from the gym, but instead I grew mentally. Upon exiting the gym everyday I felt more confident. I found myself speaking with more assertion and holding myself up higher when I walked. I feel like this heightened sense of confidence can be attributed to just feeling good about myself knowing I pushed myself to gym. Along with my confidence, I felt much happier for some reason. I really enjoyed this “personal transformation” and hope to continue my routine. Although it took a lot of time out of my day, the benefits outweigh the costs and I feel like it added a positive aspect into my daily routine. After my week of gymming I’ve learned that if I can push myself to my limit, I benefit mentally, and I’ll keep this in mind going through everyday challenges.